GDP increases by 1.3% in 2015

The economy grew by 1.3% in 2015, Statistician General Pali Lehohla announced on Tuesday.

“According to the latest preliminary indicators, the annual real estimate of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for 2015 increased by 1.3% compared with 2014,” states the Statistician General.

The economy grew by 1.3% in 2015, down from 1.5% in 2014 and 2.2% in 2013.The nominal GDP is estimated at R3,991bn for 2015 – R194bn more than 2014.

The main contributors to the increase in economic activity in 2015 were:

Finance

Real estate and business services

Mining and quarrying

Wholesale retail motor trade

Catering

Accommodation

Finance expanded by R44bn

Government expanded by R40bn

Trade expanded by R30bn

Transport expanded by R14bn

A negative contribution was recorded by the agriculture, forestry and fishing industry. Agriculture decreased by R1bn to R83bn.

Fourth quarter GDP

This follows the announcement that the seasonally adjusted real GDP at market prices for the fourth quarter of 2015 increased by an annualised rate of 0.6%, compared with an increase of 0.7% during the third quarter of 2015.

The largest contributions to the quarter-on-quarter growth of 0.6% include finance, real estate and business services and the wholesale, retail and motor trade; catering and accommodation industry each contributed 0.4 of a percentage point based on growth of 1.9% and 2.8% respectively.

General government services contributed 0.2 of a percentage point based on growth of 1.0%.

StatsSA said the economic activity in the agriculture, forestry and fishing industry reflected negative growth of 14.0% due to decreases in the production of field crops and forestry.

“Economic activity in the manufacturing industry reflected negative growth of 2.6% due to decreases in the basic iron and steel, non-ferrous metal products, metal products and machinery division, the wood and wood products, paper, publishing and printing division, and the motor vehicles, parts and accessories and other transport equipment division," it says.